Holyrood Distillery

Holyrood Distillery is the first single malt distillery in central Edinburgh since 1925. The distillery, found in the heart of Edinburgh’s historic Old Town in the shadow of Salisbury Crags, was founded in 2019 by Canadian couple and Scotch Malt Whisky Society members, Rob and Kelly Carpenter, as well as former Macallan master distiller and Scot, David Robertson. The distillery is located in a refurbished ‘engine shed’ that was once part of the terminus of the Innocent Railway. It retains an industrial feel and is part of the recent Scotch whisky renaissance occurring in Edinburgh, but Holyrood Distillery is known for the creation of tasty gins and rums like Height of Arrows and Elizabeth Yard. Then there’s its impressive range of new make spirits to whet the appetite of us whisky nerds, with editions like Chocolate Malt, Brewer’s X Distiller’s Yeast, Made By Edinburgh, and Crystal Malt making us hungry for the real thing. The real thing arrived in late 2023 with Arrival single malt Scotch whisky. One of the first single malt whiskies produced in Edinburgh in a century, it was made from malt provided by Crisp Maltings and was fermented for 104 hours using two strains of distillers yeast, DY379 and DY502. Each future release will be unique and will evolve from this recipe. That means experimenting with heritage and specialty malts, as well as a range of yeasts not typically used within scotch whisky production. Arrival was aged in oloroso butts, Pedro Ximénez hogsheads, bourbon barrels, and rum barriques.